The ultimate Weblogging system, outlined

Mathew outlines his requirements for a weblog. Certainly worth reading, and contains lots of good ideas. Sam Ruby questions “the need for a database”, but I think it’s practically impossible to create a decent weblog or information storage/retrieval system without one. You’ll only end up implementing those functions of the database anyway, even if by hand, ftping files up to a server and changing links, etc.

Saying “it’s practically impossible” in my post may have been a bit strong. It obviously is possible to use files instead of an RDBMS, as you show above.
The Unix philosophy of “everything is a file” comes to mind as I write this, although I’m a bit hungover after a night out last night so I can’t think of a decent connection, or expand on the idea!
I guess it’s what level of abstraction you’re used to. I’m used to using SQL to interact with my data, but I still use files extensively to cache as much as I can. Database accesses are so very expensive when compared to the time required to serve a flat file.

The Golden Compass
First of a three part fantasy/sci-fi series. Some people hate it because of it's anti God message but it's a great read. I found it hard to put down. There's even a Snopes article about the film adaptation.